Le Toux gives life to Union offense from midfield

CHESTER -- There's a reason Sebastien Le Toux is one of Major League Soccer's leading goal scorers. It's because his coach had put him in position to do so.

A career midfielder, Le Toux had played forward every game of the Union's inaugural season ... until Sunday.

The 26-year-old Frenchman slid into the midfield and his team thrived because of it. Le Toux scored once and assisted on his club's two other goals in the Union's 3-1 victory at PPL Park's grand opening. Fittingly, Le Toux did all of that against Seattle Sounders FC, his former club.

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"Coach wanted me to play the position. This week, he tried to get that in place," said Le Toux, crediting Union team manager Peter Nowak with the position swap. "Wednesday, I found a little bit of freedom against Reading (United) in a friendly."

The production out of Le Toux in the midfield was a must for the Union, one of the most scoring-deprived clubs in MLS. Entering Sunday's match, only one team had found the back of the net less frequently than they did.

Le Toux's move permitted rookie striker Danny Mwanga to play beside forward Alejandro Moreno up top. Mwanga, who scored a goal in his fourth consecutive match, seemed to benefit from the switcheroo just as much as Le Toux did.

"The coaching staff did a wonderful job telling us how we're going to play and where we're going to play," Mwanga said. "(Le Toux) had it going today."

Le Toux's goal -- his sixth of the season -- came on a penalty kick. He had Sounders keeper Kasey Keller guessing left. Le Toux went top-shelf on the right side to tie the score in the 55th minute.

He provided the touch that led to Fred's 79th-minute score and Mwanga's just-for-good-measure goal in the 84th.

"I think we gave everything on the field," Le Toux said.

That seems apparent.

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At halftime, Union president Tom Veit offered his assessment of PPL Park's opening.

"We have a lot of things to make better," Veit said, "but for the first time in the building -- other than the Seattle goal -- it went pretty well."

He said the Union had asked that fans show up early to stave off transportation issues and, for the most part, that warning was heeded. No estimate was available as to SEPTA's increase in service because of the match. Entering might not have been a problem, but exiting was. Three lines of cars, each being at least 20 deep, waited for more than an hour to exit the lots nearest to PPL Park.

The club will conduct a survey of season-ticket holders in the coming days, in order to determine what went right and what didn't.

Veit also addressed concerns in the week prior, with fans fearful of entering the city of Chester, where a state of emergency had been declared. According to Veit, more than 400 of the stadium's 600 employees are Chester natives. To Veit's knowledge, no complaints had been logged.

"Not a one," he said. "In fact, I've had several people come to me and say, 'This is great. We've had a great experience.'"

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A couple in-house observations:

*A fire alarm sounded more than an hour before first touch. Veit blamed the false alarm on crab fries production at Chickie's and Pete's. Another rookie mistake? The sprinkler system went into operation 10 minutes from gametime. Oops.

*Most of the parking lots were located more than a mile away from the stadium. Considering a good chunk of them provided shuttle service to the park, it still was a minor miracle that nearly every seat was occupied by game time.

*While it might require a rocket foot, it remains theoretical that a ball could leave the stadium and get water-logged in the Delaware River. While PPL Park isn't the East Coast's answer to San Francisco's McCovey Cove, there were a half-dozen single-engine fishing boats hovering along the coast -- perhaps waiting for a stray Jo'Bulani.